


Shaking and Shivering

by Sapless_Tree



Series: Bad Things Happen Bingo [1]
Category: MacGyver (TV 2016)
Genre: Angus MacGyver (MacGyver TV 2016) Whump, Bad Things Happen Bingo, Gen, Hypothermia, Whump, macgyver whump, once again Matty is merely there over the phone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-28
Updated: 2020-12-28
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:34:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28376268
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sapless_Tree/pseuds/Sapless_Tree
Summary: Bad Things Happen Bings Prompt: shaking and shiveringA full-body shudder forced Mac to slow down and take a moment to wrap his arms around himself. His face was way past numb, and snow-soaked knees stung with harsh cold. Mac cupped his stiff fingers around his mouth, blowing to try and warm them a little. It didn’t help much.
Relationships: Jack Dalton & Angus MacGyver (MacGyver TV 2016), Jack Dalton (MacGyver TV 2016) & Riley Davis, Riley Davis & Angus MacGyver (MacGyver TV 2016)
Series: Bad Things Happen Bingo [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2078250
Comments: 8
Kudos: 65
Collections: Bad Things Happen Bingo





	Shaking and Shivering

**Author's Note:**

> kinda meh about how this one turned out, but it's hard to go too wrong with hypothermia prompts yknow? haha. 
> 
> Also? Have you noticed that titling fics is like the biggest struggle ever? How original and inspiring is it to use the bthb prompt as the title lmaoooo

Post-mission, Jack was driving a crappy rental down a forest-secluded road towards ex-fil; Mac sat up front with Jack, and Riley was in the back on the phone with Matty, letting her know that the mission had gone off without a hitch. All they’d had to do was steal a flashdrive of classified intel from a secure compound. The drive’s contents were need-to-know, but the three didn’t have to know the contents to steal it. And so they didn’t.

It was snowing hard, road slick with ice, but Jack drove carefully. For once they weren’t coming in hot (Jack would joke that there wasn’t any way for them to come in hot when it was in the negatives outside) but despite any attempt at being cautious, nothing could go according to plan. Not with them. 

The car had suddenly sputtered and stopped, going dead and refusing to start up again no matter how many times Jack cussed at it. A right smack to the side of the steering wheel did nothing either, it didn’t even make Jack feel better about the car dying.

“Car just died,” Riley told Matty. “We might be late to exfil.” 

“Since when are we ever on time to exfil?” Jack asked pointedly. Riley ignored him, putting a finger in her ear to listen exclusively to Matty over the phone at her other ear.

Mac was already unlocking the passenger seat door. “Jack pop the hood, I’ll take a look,” he said, making his way out into the bitter cold. He closed the door behind him, trying to keep as much heat in the car as he could.

Jack did as he was told, as Riley reported again to Matty. “Mac’s on it now, we should be moving again soon. We’re around two hours out from the coordinates. I’ll get back to you once the car’s back in commission,” she said. She hung up a few moments later and turned to Jack. “She wants us to check in with her in an hour if we’re not moving by then.”

Eying Mac, Jack nodded a little. “We’ll be movin’ by then, don’t you worry, sweetheart. Mac’s got it.” 

The cold was brutal, sucking all the warmth out of Mac’s body all at once. The heavy snowfall made itself home in his blond locks, sticking to it and to his eyelashes. Mac’s ordinarily quick and nimble fingers were slow and numb as they worked the ports off of the car’s battery to check the fluid. 

The problem was apparent right away, so Mac put the ports back on and closed the hood again to keep things as dry as possible while he tried to think of a solution.

He opened up the car door and got back in. “Looks like the battery fluid is frozen,” Mac said as he shut the door after him. Rubbing his achingly cold hands together, he continued. “There didn’t seem to be any cracks in the case, so we just need to warm the battery to thaw out the fluid. Must’ve frozen mostly over while we were getting the flashdrive and just finally gave out once we used up whatever fluid hadn’t turned to ice.”

“All right,” Jack said. “Bring it in here, we’ll wait until it thaws out, and then we’ll be back on the road.”

“Not that simple, Jack,” Mac said, brushing some of the snow out of his hair. “It’s warmer in here than out there, but with no heater, it’ll get colder. It won’t be hot enough to thaw the fluid completely.” 

“But you’ve got an idea,” Riley said. “Right?”

“Working on it,” Mac replied. His gaze was already a bit far away as his mind worked rapidly, filtering through sulfuric acid substitutes to replace the frozen fluid entirely (ruling out most of those options due to unavailable resources) and trying to calculate heat transfer efficiency given an outside source. 

Mac flicked open his swiss army knife. “I have an idea,” he said, running his hand along the ceiling of the car. “Can one of you find me a piece of tubing or hose?” Riley leaned over the car’s seats to scrounge around in the contents of the backseat trunk. 

“Tubing?” Jack asked. “I sure hope you’re not fixin’ to suck the gas out of the tank. In case you forgot, we need that to make this thing go.”

“Didn’t forget,” Mac replied simply. Open knife in hand, Mac cut away at the car’s ceiling

“What the hell are you doing?” Jack asked, voice rising. “Matty is going to kill us because _you_ decided you wanted to wreck another rental. This is becoming a bad habit Mac-- like break-Jack’s-phone level bad habit,” he said. “Honestly I think I prefer you breaking my phone,” he tacked on with a grumble.

Mac pulled away layers of fabric and crumbly foam from the car’s headliner. “I’m glad you feel that way, because I’m going to need your phone.”

“Nice try, brother. You already pulled that back at the baddie’s compound. You’re gonna have to use a different one.”

“Oh, that's right,” Mac said. He didn’t do too well at hiding his amused smile and definitely didn’t miss the disgruntled look from one phone-less Jack Dalton as he continued to strip the headliner. “Ri?”

“No way, Mac,” Riley replied immediately from her place hanging over the backseat into the connected trunk. “I’m gonna need it to contact Matty once we’re moving again. Use yours.”

Mac finally pulled away enough layers on the car’s ceiling to hit cardboard. He began to pull that off as well and tucked it away for later use. “What’s yours at? We should keep whichever’s got a higher charge.” He pulled his out of his pocket for a moment to check the battery. “Mine’s at seventy-one.”

Riley huffed. “Fifty-four,” she said, passing it up to Mac. “Between the cold and the phone call, it must have drained it. You owe me a new phone.” 

“Take mine,” he said, accepting Riley’s phone and passing his own to her. “Any luck on the tubing?”

“There’s some,” she said, righting herself in the backseat, tubing in hand. “It’s hardly three feet. Is that long enough?”

“It’ll have to be,” Mac replied, tucking the cardboard pieces under his arm and taking the tubing from Riley. Mac grabbed the wrapper off of a piece of chewing gum, stuffed Riley’s phone and his knife in his pocket, and braced himself to go back out in the cold.

But before he could open the car door, Jack grabbed onto his arm. “Now hold on just a second there, hoss. What do you think you’re doin’ going back out into that blizzard?”

“First, it’s not a blizzard,” Mac corrected. “It’s only been snowing like this for an hour and a half at most, blizzards call for at least three hours. And second, I’m going to light a fire.” Jack’s grip loosened at the prospect of warmth.

“Okay, yeah. Right, get it nice and toasty in here to thaw that battery, I like it.”

Mac let out a little laugh. “Unless you want me to hotbox this car with CO2, the fire’s staying outside. Get the hood for me again?” Jack did, popping the thing open as Mac opened the car door. “Oh, and pull the emergency brake,” he added.

“What?” Jack asked as Mac got out of the car. “What on _earth_ for?”

“I want to make sure the car doesn’t roll when I pull the hubcap off,” Mac said, closing the car door and depositing the cardboard and tubing by the fuel door.

“What are you doin’ taking the hubcaps off for!?” Jack shouted through the closed car door, but Mac’s answer was muffled by the harsh winds that tossed his blond hair every which way. Explanation or not, Jack dutifully pulled the emergency brake, trusting Mac knew what he was doing.

Mac could hardly see a thing with the onslaught of snow; any warmth he’d regained from being in the slowly cooling car was all but gone the moment he stepped out of it. Mac moved as quickly as he could, not wanting to be out for any longer than he had to be. Sure, it wouldn’t be long until the inside of the car was just as cold as it was outside, but at least he’d be shielded from the wind and snow there.

He deposited the cardboard and tubing by the car's gas tank door and made his way back to the front. Fingers fumbling for only a few moments, Mac disconnected the battery from the car and closed the car hood. 

He brought the battery over to where he’d left the cardboard and tubing, setting it down and kneeling in the snow to get a look at the tire’s hubcap. The snow soaked through his pants at the knees-- they weren’t meant for the weather conditions, but there wasn’t much Mac could do about it. 

Mac pulled out his swiss army knife again, opening up the blade and using it to pry the little plastic covering off of the hubcap’s screw. By the time he’d gotten it loose, his hands were trembling enough that he’d nicked himself switching the blade out for the screwdriver. Breathing a quiet curse, Mac continued on, unscrewing the hubcap, pocketing the screw, and prying the thing off the wheel. The metal was frigid on his bare hands.

With the hubcap disconnected, Mac tore the cardboard into pieces small enough to set in the hubcap and then moved to open the gas tank door. He unscrewed the gas cap and fed the tubing in. 

Mac got a mouthful of gasoline while siphoning the gas out of the tank, but spat out the bitter liquid quickly, letting some of the gas splash into the hubcap before he lifted the tube back up, sending the rest of the gas back into the tank. He made sure to screw the gas cap back on and close the little door.

A full-body shudder forced Mac to slow down and take a moment to wrap his arms around himself. His face was way past numb, and snow-soaked knees stung with harsh cold. Mac cupped his stiff fingers around his mouth, blowing to try and warm them a little. It didn’t help much.

The sooner he got the fire going, however, the sooner he could get back into the car away from the snow and wind. 

With that thought in mind, Mac pulled Riley’s phone out of his pocket, cracking it open and pulling the battery out of it. He touched the gum wrapper to the positive and negative terminals a few times, keeping near to the hubcap. One of the sparks finally hit the gasoline and set the small pile of cardboard ablaze, contained within the hubcap. 

Wracked with shudders, Mac dragged the car battery as close as he safely could to the small fire, and let himself take a moment to try and rub his numb fingers warm again.

A tapping on the window from inside the car startled Mac. But a quick glance and he could see Jack’s worried gaze on him-- he pointed at Mac and held a thumb up in a sort of ‘ _you good?_ ’ gesture. Mac gave his own shaky thumbs-up to Jack, slowly getting up from the spot he’d kneeled by the small fire.

The moment he moved his body the wind threatened to snuff out the flames, so Mac moved back to kneeling there and sitting on his heels, body blocking the harsh winds from putting the tiny fire out. Jack must have noticed, because a few moments later, the rental’s door was being opened, and Jack was making his way to where the shivery blond was.

“What’s goin’ on?” Jack asked, having to shout to be heard over the wind. “You done yet or what? You’re starting to look like Mr. Snow Miser out here, come on, let’s get you back in the car, buddy.” 

Mac shook his head, clumps of snow falling from where they’d stuck themselves in his hair. “N-No, Jack. If I move, then the-- the fire,” he gestured to the flames, “it’ll go out. The wind-- it’s too strong fo-for such a small fire.”

Jack ran his hand along his face, blinking rapidly against the snow. “All right,” he said over the noise of the storm. “All right,” he said again, “move your skinny butt over. If you’re staying out here then so am I, but I wanna be nice and close to that fire.” Jack was already making his way to sit next to Mac, but Mac pushed him away.

“Don’t be stupid,” Mac said, barely loud enough for Jack to hear. “There’s no-- no reason for both of us to be-- to be fr-- f--” Mac’s numb mouth stuck on the ‘f’ sound of ‘freezing’ for a while before he could get the word out, “--freezing out here. Go back in the-- the--” Mac gestured to the car. “I’ll be in when the battery’s thawed.” 

“Nah, man,” Jack said. Snowflakes had begun to stick to his eyelashes. “You go kaboom, I go kaboom,” he said. “Except in this case, the ‘kaboom’ is gon’ be cold and snowy and slow. You’ve been out here long enough as it is, but I know your stubborn ass ain’t moving until that thing’s workin’ right, yeah?”

Mac didn’t say anything, but that was all the confirmation Jack needed. Mac didn’t push him away this time as he came and sat next to Mac, getting close so as to share some body heat.

“The least I can do is sit myself down right here, and keep you company,” Jack said. “And hopefully we can get you a bit warmer, I’m really not liking how pale you’re looking.” 

“I’m fi-- fine,” Mac insisted, pulling the battery a little closer to his shaking body. Jack gave him an unimpressed stare, hoping the look made it across despite them both squinting against the harsh wind. “Little cold,” Mac admitted.

“A little? You’re shaking like a damn autumn leaf, kid,” Jack said. “Give me your hands, don’t need your little digits all freezing over.” Jack took Mac’s cold hands in his own and unzipped his jacket just enough to fit Mac’s hands under his armpit. 

Mac closed his eyes, enjoying the feeling of warmth-- real warmth on his shivery, numb fingers. “You’re warm,” he mumbled, the words were mostly lost to the noise of the storm. 

“What’d you say?” Jack asked, tearing his eyes from the fire to look at Mac. “Hey, no. Eyes open right now.” Mac obeyed, opening his eyes and meeting Jack’s gaze. “You scare me like that again and we’re ditching this dinky little fire. I’d carry you all the way to exfil if it came to that, you know that, Mac?” 

Mac nodded just as Riley was opening the car’s passenger side door.

“How’s it going out here?” She asked.

“Not great,” Jack answered her. “Fire’s small, winds are too strong for it, this battery ain’t thawing nearly as fast as I woulda hoped, and I’m pretty sure Mac’s gettin’ hypothermic out here.”

“I’m not,” Mac argued from his place next to Jack, his hands still being warmed under the older man’s jacket.

Ignoring Mac’s protests, Riley started to speak again. “That’s not good. Forget the battery, I’m gonna call Matty and see about getting exfil to come to us. Why don’t you two come get out of the cold?”

“Once we know they’re coming for us we will. I don’t think we’ve got another chance at a fire-- Mac really fried your phone. If exfil can’t come and we’re stuck on our own, we’ll have to fall back on our plan A here,” Jack said, gesturing to the battery and fire. 

Riley nodded. “I’ll be quick,” she said, closing the car door again and making the call. True to her word, she _was_ quick. Riley had only been on the phone with Matty for a few minutes before she was opening up the car door again.

“They can’t land a chopper out here,” Riley told the two, “because of all the trees-- there’s no safe place to land that would be any closer than where they are now. And the storm definitely isn’t helping on that front, either. Matty’s sent a car to come and transport us to exfil. ETA is about two hours.”

“All right, thanks sweetheart,” Jack said. “C’mon, Mac.”

“But th-- the fire--” Mac 

Hauling Mac to his feet, Jack spoke. “We’re done with that thing, weren't you listening to Riley? Not gonna have you freeze to death out here for something that might not’ve even worked.” The fire went out the moment the two were standing. 

Mac gazed at hubcap and snuffed-out fire for a moment, but ultimately let Jack guide him back into the backseat of the car. It wasn’t much warmer in there, but the absence of wind and snow was definitely an improvement. 

“Let’s see those hands, yeah?” Jack said once the car door was closed after them. He pulled Mac’s hands out from where he’d been keeping them warm under his armpit; they were bright red and still cold. “Move ‘em around, get some circulation going. Don’t rub,” Jack said, flexing his own freezing fingers. Mac did as he was told.

“You guys are practically snowed over,” Riley said, helping the two brush some of the snow out of their hair and off their shoulders as they tried to warm their hands up. Both of them were shivery and pink-skinned from the cold. “Are you going to be okay until the car Matty sent for gets here?”

“We’re going to-- to have to be,” Mac answered.

“We’ll be all right,” Jack assured, motioning for Riley to join him and Mac in the backseat. She crawled over the center console to sit with them. “We share body heat, keep a close eye on ‘the umbles’, and stay awake until help gets here, then we should be okay.”

Jack pulled his kids close, Mac shivering heavily and Riley clinging more for comfort than for warmth yet. 

Jack himself was feeling pretty frozen, but he knew that Mac had been out in that storm far longer than him; he could only imagine how cold the poor kid was. 

The three of them stayed huddled close for a long while, making sure to keep light conversation as it slowly grew colder. Maybe thirty minutes had passed by the time Riley was shivering as well. Jack was growing more and more concerned-- Mac’s shaking had almost become violent with how hard shudders were wracking his frame. Another twenty-five after that and Mac was hardly shivering at all anymore.

“You staying awake there, buddy?” Jack asked, not liking that it had begun to seem like only he and Riley were talking.

Mac gave a small nod and a quiet “yeah,” but didn’t say anything else.

“Ri, honey, how’re you holding up?”

Riley shifted and pressed herself up harder against Jack. She and Mac were practically sitting in Jack’s lap at that point. “Fine,” she answered through chattering teeth. “Cold. But fine. How about you, Jack?”

“Yeah, cold sounds ‘bout right,” Jack said. “Exfil transport should be just about an hour out by now. You kids just hold on for me.”

“Did-- did you make the SOS?” Mac asked clumsily, words slurring together.

Jack hugged Mac a little closer to his body, brows furrowing. “No, man. Matty knows where we’re at.”

“We ran out of rocks?” He questioned, lifting his head up away from Jack as if to go searching for some. Jack gently pulled Mac back into place and shushed his confused murmurings.

“Jack, what’s he talking about?” Riley asked, concern written on her face.

“Siberia, probably,” Jack said. “Now _that_ was a cold op. Cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey, I’d imagine.”

“One,” Riley began, “gross. And two, we’re…” she trailed off, eyeing Mac, who seemed determined to get up and was mumbling something about a snowmobile. Jack wouldn’t let him up, though. He merely held the freezing blond in place as he tried to get him to sit still. “We’re going to be okay, right Jack?”

“Of course we are, honey,” Jack reassured, finally getting Mac to settle. “Of course we are. Me and Mac were okay after Siberia, and we’ll be okay here once our guys come pick us up.” Jack shifted his position slightly, bringing his legs up and moving Mac and Riley closer together-- that way their little huddle was more of a circle than a line. “Granted, we were dressed a lot warmer then, too. We’re losing too much heat I think. Curl your legs up and try to keep your chest close to mine and Mac’s,” Jack instructed.

Riley did as he said, and helped Jack gently maneuver Mac’s legs up as well. They sat huddled up together like that long enough for the position to become uncomfortable. But all they could do was wait. Time stood still as they sat huddled in that car. It was slow, boring, and so very cold. 

The slew of conversation had slowly been replaced by chattering teeth and the occasional, “y’all awake?” From Jack. 

A shivery “yeah,” from Riley and Mac was the response the first few times, but after another so many check-ups, Mac’s “yeah” had become a near-inaudible hum.

“Mac,” Jack said, “you know the-- the rules, full words or I g-get to smack ya,” he said, trying to keep his tone light despite the three’s deteriorating states. Mac didn’t give any response to the light-hearted threat. “Mac? Hey, kid?” Jack shook Mac’s shoulder, and then again a little rougher when the blond didn’t react. “Open yo-- your eyes, man,” he said. 

Mac wasn’t waking up. Jack swore.

“They shoulda be-- been here by now,” Jack said, impatiently bouncing his leg a few times. “Ri, how long’s it been since you-- since you called Matty?”

Riley pulled Mac’s phone from her pocket and turned the thing on with a shaking hand. 

“An hour and fifty-two minutes,” she said through chattering teeth. 

“‘S been long enough, call her and get her to-- to get that car here now. We’re not gonna make it mu-- much longer,” he said. By ‘we’ both Riley and Jack knew he was talking about the unconscious genius slumped against the both of them, but they also knew it wouldn’t be too long before they were in the same situation.

While Riley dialed the number with numb fingers, Jack felt Mac’s neck for a pulse, finding it slow and sluggish but still there. Matty picked up after only two rings. Riley put the phone on speaker.

“How are you guys doing?” Marty’s voice filtered in through the phone’s speaker.

Jack's response was immediate. “Where the _hell_ is our transport at?” 

“That good, huh?” Matty said. “They should be there soon-- the snow might’ve slowed them down a little, but I haven’t gotten any word that they’ll be unable to make it there in a timely manner. Your transport is scheduled to arrive in seven minutes.”

“You tell them to-- to hurry up,” Jack said. “M-Make some calls, pull some-- some strings.”

There was a sigh from the other line, and likely an eye roll they couldn’t see to go along with it. “I can’t just make some calls and stop a blizzard, Jack. I can threaten people, and I can blackmail, but the weather doesn't care. A lot of people owe me favors, but unfortunately God isn’t one of them,” she said. “The car will get there when it gets there, and you three are going to stay awake and alive until it does, do you understand me?”

Riley spoke up then, “Mac's unconscious,” she said. “That’s why we called.”

“Well, wake him up, then,” Matty said as if it were obvious, though there was a certain concern in her tone that overlaid her commanding voice.

“Can’t. Tried,” Jack said, jostling the blond’s shoulder again in an unsuccessful attempt to rouse him. “Pulse is slow a-and-- and weak, too. We need that car, like, a-an hour ago, Matty.”

It was quiet for a moment before Matty spoke again. “I don’t know what you want me to do, Jack. Transportation is coming as fast as we can get it to you. I can contact them and yell, but that isn’t going to do anything,” she said. There was some noise over the line like Matty was talking to someone else in the room with her. “I had someone contact your exfil transport. Their ETA is two minutes. You three can last two minutes,” she told them.

Jack let out a cold, shuddery sigh. “Matty we’re-- we’re not doin’ too hot out here.”

“That wasn’t a reassurance, Jack,” she said, but her voice betrayed her. “It’s an order. You three _will_ last two more minutes, and then you’re getting into that fully-heated car and heading straight for a hospital, you hear me?” 

Jack gave an affirmative, followed by Riley’s “yes ma’am.” 

“To help you stay awake, we can start your debrief now,” Matty said. All of the normal business seriousness was gone from her voice-- her guise of wanting to get work done was seen through easily, but if it kept Jack and Riley awake and talking for those two minutes, then she didn’t care obvious she was being.

Jack played along the best he could, complaining light-heartedly about having to work while Riley began to fill Matty in about the mission a little. Jack couldn’t help but continuously press his numb fingers against Mac’s cold neck, if only to reassure himself that the pulse was still there.

Two minutes seemed like an eternity to Jack as he watched a still blond partner with dusty blue lips breathe slowly, and his little girl shiver hard enough to make her jacket zipper clink against itself. He would never admit it, but Jack wasn’t doing so great himself, either. 

But eventually, headlights came into view. Their exfil transport.

Jack could have cheered-- he may have, in fact. He wouldn’t remember whether or not he had later in the hospital. He _would_ remember scooping up Mac’s unresponsive form and hooking an arm around Riley to get to the car. He’d remember how the sudden heat of the warm car felt like fire on his face. And how that even if his face was on fire, he wouldn’t have cared much-- it was warm. And warmth meant his kids were going to be okay.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm planning on filling all the prompts on my bingo card (feel free to request one you wanna see sooner rather than later at @you-go-kaboom-i-go-kaboom on tumblr) but it'll be at a leisurely pace between other projects :)


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